Perhaps the field was fairly new even when I was nearly ten! Today I’m nearer to seven times ten and it’s nothing like it was way back then.
I reminisce about the time we cousins numbering a couple of dozen used to descend for the summer holidays to roam free at our grandparents’ home in Bangalore. We were among the 64 progeny of the 17 siblings who grew up in the gracious old bungalow. Enjoying the aftermath of the April showers, a major delight was slipping through single file or vaulting over the turnstile that separated Oorgaum House, known as OH, the sprawling two-acre property of the P.G. D’Souzas, into New Field, owned by the Jesuit Congregation, founders of the St. Joseph’s Indian educational institutions.
Grouping age-wise perhaps, we’d eagerly engage in the chatter of youngsters or teasing that ended in occasional scraps and fights. Ducking one another in the stream I remember as part of the routine; so too the tosses and bruises surely for the more adventurous.
For garlands
With Cork and Kirk trees lining the edge of the field alongside an open drain, the delicate white blooms the Cork trees shed were ideal to twine into garlands. The tangy fruit of the Kirk trees was unique, entailing some endeavour with pods to be peeled and pink-hued skins deseeded, before devouring! Another thrill was to sail the empty shells (resembling boats) that dropped from the silk cotton trees. Silk cotton was a major ingredient used to fill pillows those times. Post a rain-shower we’d chase the tadpoles that slithered about the drain in copious numbers. Quite easy to trap in our hankies, but extremely challenging to manipulate the entire catch into Gran’s old jam bottles first filled with drain water.
When tired of New Field, our cousinly camaraderie continued within the ancestral home compound. Tapping rubber from the rubber tree, winding and wrapping the liquid over a stone, then exulting if an irregular shaped grimy ball actually bounced was a competitive experience! Mingling with the poultry, the cows and goats, running away from vicious geese and ‘gobbledy’ turkeys, following ‘Cow’ John, the attender of these delightful specimens was a favourite pastime.
Time for buttermilk
Lunch time, and it was a rush for ‘home-made’ buttermilk at the hands of Mary aunty who’d be churning’ it in a mud pot with a ladle secured with ropes. It was frothy, fresh and cool to dish out to thirsty kids. Thereafter it was off to Gran’s kitchen to observe her work with an iron blower at the old wood fire, at which we’d all try to have a ‘go’, raking up more ashes into the food being cooked, than flames! How we presumed on her immense patience with us...
Tea-time was treat-time with a baker turning up on the doorstep furiously ringing his bicycle bell to announce his arrival with freshly baked bread, buns and delights like butter biscuits, cream horns, Japanese cakes and butter beans packed neatly into a trunk fitted on the carrier. Naturally, with our numbers the entire load would be sold out at OH and consumed.
Time for a bath
Bathing at dusk was a unique experience too with a bhan, or iron pot, built into the wall of the bathroom, half within and half without, stoked with firewood by the attender without, and containing steaming hot water exuding an aroma that is irreplaceable today. This itself before dinner and bedtime would ensure a sleep of the babes! At times we’d be blown out of our wits though with the croaking of a frog keeping us company.
‘The family that prays together stays together’ was an adage strictly followed at the ancestral home and daily the clan would gather for the family rosary led by Gran and the elders, prior to suppertime, and maybe a ‘singsong’ around the piano, before we all spread out to sleep; many opting for mattresses on the floor of the large hall to carry on the ‘lights off’ chit-chat, ghost stories and fool around a bit more, till a happy dreamland claimed us…
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